I am . . .

A vintage junkie, a legendary vintage junkie, who tries her best to put all of her insane & illogical feelings & illusions into words. I am who I am.

"You can do anything, you just have to dress for it."

Edith Head

a.s x

September 12, 2011

Where do we go from here.

I wouldn't want to get political on anybody. But in this day and age we're expected to know about everything that goes on around us. Am I upset about that? You'd think not, but it's all just too much to handle.

Yes I'm talking about the wars, the politicians, the revolutions, the corruption & everything else that we see daily on our television sets and in our newspapers. I am NO political expert, in fact I'm no where near that. I currently live in Egypt and after January 25th, after the revolution had succeeded in bringing down those in charge of it's past 30 years of corruption and theft, somehow every single Egyptian is categorized into a certain group of people. You've got the Muslim Brotherhood, The Salafis, the Liberalists, the revolutionists, the anti-revolutionists, yes the list could go on and whether you like it or not, and whether you know it or not you will be labelled as one of these names no matter what your belief is, what you say or what you do.

Non-the-less that will never get in the way of me saying what I need to say. And what I need to say is this;

I did believe in the revolution that began on January 25th. I believed that Egypt had enough good in it to change, to grow, to make me for the first time in my life, want to be here. To even dream of a future here.But I believe I was sadly mistaken. It didn't take me long to realize that so very few people understood the world revolution the way I did. And even fewer people understood the word 'civilized.' Oh I don't mean to be judgmental, or sarcastic I'm simply stating the obvious. For the past six months the country's state has been declining, which as many of us believe is part of the predicted outcome after any revolution. But the problem is, there has been no benefits except for Mubarak and his gang being kicked out of their big comfortable leather seats which they'd placed so highly above everyone else for the past three decades.

I will not deny that getting Mubarak to step down was one of the hardest thing's accomplished in Egypt's political history. No one thought it was even possible since his name was never even mentioned in public out of fear that any under cover agent who'd worked for the government would be around, in which case you'd end up being locked up in a place where even you yourself wouldn't find you. Yes things were bad, and yes I believe that since they couldn't get any worse we had to fight our fight and scream out how we felt and what we believed in. But what happens now? Egypt's population is currently over 85 million. Over the past six months there've been constant protesting and many are in fury over the way things have been turning out, i.e; Mubarak and his family being put to trail, along with all the other accused who were part of the corrupt political and governmental system.

I'm not here to get into political details and dates. Like I said before I am no expert on politics and I find it hard to keep up with every single thing going on, every single protest, which by the way happens almost every Friday with a different name or cause. What disappoints me is that we are unable to unite like we did on January 25th. Every single individual who has anything to complain about takes it up at Tahrir Square. And whether their issue is big or small they all expect all their problems to be solved immediately, and if they are not , or if they're met with different opinions, then that sparks a war between Egypt's citizens. We aren't listening to each tother, we're not communicating, we're so behind and we need to get ahead. I believe that instead of worrying and arguing about Mubarak's trial and the money he's supposed to give back, we can start worrying about those who can't feed themselves or their families, those uneducated, those without work, the HUGE TRAFFIC ISSUE we all suffer from, or how about the garbage we all see lying around everywhere? The list is pretty big.

Instead of attacking the Israeli Embassy we could start working harder, try making our schools better, build a better educational system than the one that has us begging for foreign teachers and curriculums. Or how about we start paying attention and finding out more about our upcoming presidential candidates? That's an idea!

We want a successful revolution, a civilized evolution. What is civilization? It's a mind set, a way to live, a way to be and a way to behave. It is to respect each other and the very basic and simple humane instincts we all should have whether we're old, young, Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, Liberalist, Atheist, man, women, rich or poor. It's that instinct that tells you to not throw garbage in the street, to not harass a lady because YOU think her outfit is provocative, or simply because you fancy her face or her hair, or even her veil. It's that instinct that tells you to not cut in line in front of someone at the grocery store, to not talk about someone behind his back and act friendly when face to face, and it's that same instinct that tells you to not cheat on your high school finals just because the examiner allows it. I could go on forever but I don't think I need to. These are all simple examples but they convey my message. You see some of us have this instinct, these basic morals, but when you've got about 70 % of Egypt's population earning less than $2 a day, you're bound to have a starving army of people who will not remain quiet, weak, robbed and ignored.

And that's where Egypt is today, everyday factory workers, employees go on strikes, refuse to work, they block main roads and prevent other people from reaching their work places in order to get attention and have their demands met. It's become out of control, and it's tearing our country apart.

Where do I see this going? Well if the majority of Egyptians still behave the way they do, stumping their little feet every time they're upset over something, burning and tearing things down and attacking each other, then we won't last. Those who claim they're Liberalist must stop criticizing those who even show any religious faith labeling them as old fashioned and ignorant. Those who belong to the Muslim Brotherhood must also stop claiming that those aren't with them aren't real 'Muslims' and that their way is the only right way. And most importantly those who were part of the revolution fighting for 'democracy' must learn to accept, and listen to those points of view who don't ALWAYS agree with their own. I've learned that we the more we understand one another, the stronger our bond is, the stronger our country will be, the harder it will be for anyone to take us down. And only then do we rise.